Image quality of digital cameras is driven primarily by the size and number of the pixels in the camera's image sensor. The size of the pixels drive the camera sensitivity, which is a measure of the camera's ability to capture light. Higher sensitivity result in a greater amount of light being captured in a given exposure time, thereby increasing signal-to-noise ratio, which is a measure of image quality. The resolution of the image sensor, which is measured by the number of pixels in combination with optical resolution of the cameras lens, drives the ability of a camera to capture detail.
In modern smart phones and other small devices, industrial design has trended towards thinner form factors, which constrains the height available for the camera. This constraint creates a tension between attainable image quality and smartphone thickness in the region of a camera because the camera's sensor size drives the overall camera height due to lens height being a function of sensor size. This tension typically results in reduced pixel size and camera sensitivity or reduced pixel count and resolution. Reduced pixel size and camera sensitivity decreases lowlight image quality, thus causing images in the light to be noisy, or in longer exposure times, which can result in blurry images due to camera or subject motion. Further, reduced pixel count and resolution can result in lower image detail.
Some incomplete conventional solutions include multi-aperture “array” cameras to address this constraint between attainable image quality and camera thickness. With multiple imagers, additional light can be captured in a given exposure time without increasing height. Use of multiple imagers to attain higher-quality images, however, requires computationally expensive techniques to fuse images from each of the cameras into a single image. Even with these computationally expensive techniques, artifacts can still be present that are noticeable to the naked eye.
This background description is provided for the purpose of generally presenting the context of the disclosure. Unless otherwise indicated herein, material described in this section is neither expressly nor impliedly admitted to be prior art to the present disclosure or the appended claims.